Looking Through a Lens

"The eruption in the media and on photo blogs last week over an image taken on 9/11 by the German photographer Thomas Hoepker--and the glib interpretation put upon it by Frank Rich in the New York Times--has proved once again that we don't need Photoshop to doctor the meaning of an image."

Art critic Richard Woodward discusses in the WSJ the war of words triggered in the blogsphere by this photograph depicting five young Brooklynites on the Brooklyn waterfront seemingly engaged in a fun and relaxed conversation while the WTC burns in the background.

As reported by David Friend in his book "Watching the World Change: The Stories Behind the Images of 9/11," Herr Hoepker, who never spoke to his subjects, saw the New Yorkers in the photograph as "totally relaxed like any normal afternoon. They were just chatting away. It's possible they lost people and cared, but they were not stirred by it. . . .I can only speculate [but they] didn't seem to care."

Read here what happened next.

In Latin America

Just finished doing a massive piece for a chain of Latin American newspapers covering the fine arts scene in the Greater Washington, DC region. I'm now hoping to sell them on doing the same thing for some of the other major art scenes in the Mid Atlantic.

More later...

Philly Art Falls Guide

...the town that birthed Thomas Eakins is pushing paint again this fall.

Roberta Fallon, writing in the Philadelphia Weekly, gives us a preview to the visual arts highlights coming this fall. Read it here.

In her superb co-blog, Roberta also visits the newest gallery in Philly.

Cerulean Arts is owned by Michael Kowbuz and Tina Rocha, and located at 1355 Ridge Avenue. Their grand opening show includes work by Astrid Bowlby, Pat Boyer, Eric Brown, John Bybee, Alexander Cheves, Michael Kowbuz, Nancy Lewis, Yuri Makoveychuk, Meg McDevitt, Hiro Sakaguchi, Mark Shetabi and Kevin Strickland.

According to Fallon, the gallery's "exhibition program is not locked down yet but the pair said they'd have six-week shows, not month-long. Artists who will be featured in upcoming solo or group shows are Sara Roche, Alexander Cheves, Jeffrey Tritt, Binod Shrestha, Hiro Sakaguchi and Yuri Makoveychuk."

Wyeths

Went to the Brandywine Museum to see Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth and Basquiat and will be writing a review for a couple of newspapers and also a review here. Stay tuned.

While there I was lucky enough to run into the fair Victoria Wyeth, grandaughter of Andrew and niece of Jamie, who gave us all a terrific tour of the museum with a lot of great personal insights into the Wyeth family.

Black Artists of DC

Black Artists of DC (BADC) is a community of artists formed in 1999 whose purpose is to "promote, develop and validate the cultural and artistic expressions of artists of African ancestry in the Washington, DC metropolitan area."

The exhibit "Convergence of Vision: The Power of Art," showing at the Prince George's Community College's (PGCC) Marlborough Gallery from September 18th through October 12th will be the group's first showing at a public venue and will feature the work of 34 of the group's artists.

"As a group, BADC seeks to engage and educate our community in the history and value of Black art," says Claudia Gibson-Hunter, BADC facilitator. "There is such a wealth of artistic talent in the Washington metropolitan area, and we want to expose our community to the hidden treasures they have right in their own backyards."

Details here.